A new book sheds light on a difficult decision some parents in Mexico are facing: trading one form of violence for another. That choice centers on informal treatment centers known as anexos — they’re purportedly for people suffering from addiction or mental health issues. But, as Angela Garcia, an anthropologist and professor at Stanford, explains, what goes on inside is controversial.
Garcia wrote a book called "The Way that Leads Among the Lost: Life, Death and Hope in Mexico City’s Anexos" and joined The Show to talk about what she found.
Full conversation
MARK BRODIE: Angela, for folks who might not be familiar with Anexos, can you please start off by explaining what exactly they are?
ANGELA GARCIA: Sure, they are lay treatment centers for addiction, mental illness. They're run by and for Mexico's working poor, which comprises over 50% of the population, and they're not regulated, they're run by people with no professional training. And they are known for their use of coercion and violence, and so they're, they're very controversial in Mexico. At the same time, they're proliferating throughout the country.
BRODIE: What kinds of coercion and violence do we see in these?
GARCIA: Well, people are kidnapped. That is their entry into these spaces, which I should say tend to be one room filled with anywhere between 15 and 40 people. They're kidnapped in a pretty brutal way that mimics some of the tactics of criminal organizations, and they're thrown in, literally thrown into these spaces.
And they stay there until their family can no longer pay because there is a monthly fee or they escape or they're deemed in some way rehabilitated. In addition to the kidnapping as a way of entry, there's the use of both psychological and physical violence in these spaces, but there's, they're deemed a form of treatment.
BRODIE: But as you say, the people who are running these and doing the treatment don't really have any training in how to do it, so. Like for the, for the people who attend these, these anexos, do they actually get any kind of help for the the issues they're dealing with?
GARCIA: Well, that was precisely what I was looking at, and the training that people get, those that run them, is essentially having been in them themselves. So a lot like in the U.S. where you have addiction treatment counselors, many of whom were, you know, had addiction problems themselves, it's in Mexico.
And the kinds of things that I was looking at, I realized quickly that not everyone there had problems with drug addiction or mental illness. A lot of the people in there, and we're talking about a very young population, were at risk of the violence that surrounds the drug war.
So over time I began to understand that while there were and are people who have addiction problems and problems with mental health, a lot of the young people that are there are actually vulnerable to both criminal and neighborhood violence, and so their families, usually mothers, put them into these spaces as a way to keep them safe.
BRODIE: This is one of the more interesting aspects I think that you write about in terms of it's almost like picking a less problematic form of violence for these parents who are sending their, their kids to these. Because as you say, they're trying to escape cartel violence, but at the same time, the place where these kids are being sent, they, they will, in some cases, maybe more than some, be victims of violence themselves there.
GARCIA: Exactly, and the decision to put kids into these spaces weighs very heavily on parents and particularly women. And you know, they have to make a kind of ethical wager between what is worse, what is better. And they put their kids in knowing that, you know, they might come out 20 pounds thinner, they might come out bruised, they might come out, you know, depressed or angry, and yet families often see these as their best option for keeping their kids or young adults safe from the pervasive violence across Mexico.4:27
BRODIE: So is the calculation then basically at its, maybe at, at its basest is, “yes, my child might come out bruised, mentally wounded, scarred, but they will come out, they'll be alive.”
GARCIA: Exactly. And a lot of mothers that I talked to said, “you know, I know things are going on inside, but I know where my kid is. I know they're being fed. I know there's, you know, are around people similarly situated. I know they're getting attention, but most importantly, I know where they are.”
BRODIE: What do you think the proliferation of these anexos says about the state of society in Mexico? Maybe the, the, the state of the amount of violence, cartel violence that is there right now?
GARCIA: Well, that was how I really began to understand them, as a lens upon the state of Mexico today, and they're proliferating precisely because violence is intensifying.
And I, and I really want to add that there are also anexos in the United States and so Mexican immigrants are bringing this structure of treatment into the U.S., but the issues that are described in these anexos are very different.
Here in the U.S., rather than talking about, you know, experiences of drug-related violence or criminal violence, people will talk about their concerns around immigration status, finding affordable housing. And, and yet they use the structure and method of anexos in Mexico in order to address problems that immigrant communities here are facing.
BRODIE: Well, I'm curious what you heard from some of the, the kids who were in anexos in Mexico about, specifically about the calculation that, that their parents made about, yes, this place might not be great, but it sure seems a lot better than not being there.
GARCIA: For the most part, the people that I talked to recognized that their families, their mothers were trying to keep them safe, you know. They weren't happy about it. A lot of them described anger, resentment, feelings that, you know, “when I get out I'm never gonna speak to my mother again.”
But they also recognized that, you know, their families had to work very hard to keep them in these places, and so there was a level of commitment to them that they, they acknowledged and, and so some of them, you know, would say to me, you know, “I hate that I'm here, I hate that my mother put me here, but I know that she did it because she loves me and she doesn't want to lose me,” and that's precisely what mothers would say.
They would say, you know, “my kid is driving me nuts. I don't feel safe, but I don't want to lose my kid. So I'm gonna put them here and I'm gonna risk the kinds of risks that exist in anexos, but, but I see them as a safer option.” And the kids that were in there recognized that their mothers had to make this difficult decision.
BRODIE: So what do you think the future of anexos looks like both in Mexico and in the U.S.?
GARCIA: I think so long as there are the kinds of intense social problems and economic problems that both countries are facing, especially for low-income people and in this country, for undocumented immigrants, they're just going to keep proliferating and and that really says a lot about the world that we live in, that people have to make this kind of decision in order to keep their loved ones safe.